Celeb news: Lady Gaga and the 'drug that was her friend'

Lady Gaga has appeared in an honest and revealing interview about her late teenage years and her battle with a cocaine habit.

The 25-year-old sat down with The Conversation’s Amanda de Cadenet to talk about how her decision to pursue music at 19 years old led her to a period of depression, loneliness and an addiction to cocaine.

She also talked about love, sex, marriage and how she doesn’t have a home. She said:

“I was very depressed when I was 19 because I decided to pursue music, decided to drop out of school, told my parents I didn’t want any money from them. I got three jobs, and I just hit the ground running, did it on my own. And I would go back to my apartment every day and I would just sit there. It was quiet and it was lonely. It was still. It was just my piano and myself.”

“I had a television and I would leave it on all the time just to feel like somebody was hanging out with me. And especially during the period when I was doing cocaine. It was like the drug was my friend. And I never did it with other people. It’s such a terrible way to fill that void, because it just adds to that void, really, because it’s not real. It’s endless and at a certain point, I just began to feel sick.”

“I sort of f**king woke up one day and was like, ‘You’re an a**hole. You’re not an artist. If you were a real f**king artist, you’d be focused on your music. You wouldn’t be spending your money on the white devil.'”

“There’s this perception and romanticism around the drug, that it’s sexy or that it’s so artistic or that your troubled and you’re going to make great music, when really, you’re just a f**king loser. I just stopped and focused 150 per cent of my energy on my happiness.”‘

You can watch the full interview here.

Last week we shared another video from The Conversation where Gwyneth Paltrow talked about her battle with postnatal depression and dealing with the loss of her father. You can view that video here.